Advertisement
Published: April 20th 2014
Nothing is constant in this world except for change. I came here with the expectation that I'd teach for 5 months, move back home, and move on with my life and career. Yet here I am almost exactly 2 months into my time in Chile, and all of that has changed. I'm now staying here for 10 months (maybe a little longer if I can afford to travel when I finish teaching), then I will be moving back home to move on with my life and career, but in a much different and more positive way than I originally envisioned. I have decided and made the commitment to remain here to teach for the entire school year and while it was a decision I really agonized over, all along I've known it's the right choice for me. Regardless of what career choices I could have made after returning home after only 5 months, staying here longer gives the opportunity to become functionally fluent in Spanish and in my mind, that skill is entirely more valuable than any amount of money I could make working in those 5 extra months. Doubters will tell me that I could certainly learn Spanish at home
if I wanted, and they are absolutely correct. But at what expense in terms of both time and money? There is no better way to learn a language than through immersion and while it's been a slow process, I know I am learning and improving tremendously. I don't know if fluency in Spanish will be something I will ever use in a career back home, but having that skill upon my departure from here makes me so much more marketable as an employee and, in my mind, is just an extremely valuable skill to have given the rapidly changing demographics in the US. Despite the ability to learn Spanish, being here has given me the kind of clarity and change of atmosphere I needed to reflect upon what I truly want out of my career and life. Again, that's something I could have done without traveling 5000 miles from home, but being here has helped me tremendously when it comes to the "finding myself" category. After being in the classroom here for only a month, I knew that my time as a teacher was over. I could do it for a few more years out of necessity if I needed
to, but it just doesn't bring me the joy I need to feel fulfilled and happy. I think I've known that for a while now, but after spending 10 years preparing to work in a field and then working in that field, completely changing course is a hard choice to make. And I'm glad I've taken my time with this choice. It's not something I want to take lightly. It's my life and I don't want to just drift in the wind until I find what it is that I truly want to do. It might not look good for a resume that I've had a long gap in employment and that I spent a year working outside the US, but if it helps me to find what I want to do 40+ hours a week for the next 30-40 years, then it's certainly worth it to me.
And that brings me to that lingering question: What will I do when I get home? I think I wrote a little about this in my last post, but I don't remember so sorry if this repeats what I previously wrote. During the past 2 or 3 years ago when I'd
talk with teacher friends of mine and they'd all complain about how under appreciated they felt or how they felt like the politicians making policy decisions regarding education had no idea what they were doing, I'd always joke about how if I wanted to move on from teaching and work in a field where I could try and improve things for teachers and students, I should work in educational law. Obviously I'm not going to change the world, but it's at least a field where I could potentially have a minor impact on policy, and that would make me feel good. But I always said it jokingly, and everyone else always took it as a joke. I think the thought of spending 3 more years in school and spending $150,000+ just terrified me. But about a year ago I made that same comment to my brother and his wife, and Steve looked at me and said "Why not?" He was the first one to
not take my comment as a joke, and it jarred me. I had been joking about it for so long that I never even took my own thoughts or comments seriously. And so that question: "Why
not?" became a tiny little seed in the back of my mind. And after losing my job last June, it slowly grew as I thought about it more and more. And after spending a lot of time thinking and reading and researching, I'm finally taking "Why not?" seriously. And so to answer the question I first posed, I want to go to law school when I get home. After finishing my Masters, I never thought I'd go back to school. The time and money involved terrified me, and as someone who is usually concerned with their finances, the money aspect still does scare me. But if it's going to bring me to a place where I'll have the opportunity to work in the field I love (education) but in a manner that excites me more and hopefully gives me the sense of fulfillment I seek, then the money doesn't matter. It's an obstacle, of course, but one that can certainly be overcome. What matters to me is the end goal. Will it help bring me to a place where I can have a career that I enjoy and feel good about? If I feel confident that the answer is yes,
then I'm in 200% to pursuing it and doing whatever is necessary to achieving my goals. And so that's what I will be working towards for the next 18 months. First, spending the next few months here preparing to take the LSAT in October and after that, completing applications and moving on to study for a new career beginning in Fall, 2015. It's a long way off, but I'm already excited about it.
Now that that's finally on paper, let's talk about Chile! First, I finally ate one of the truly traditional dishes here: pastel de choclo. Now I've had some people ask me why it took me 2 months to try some traditional food. First, this isn't the first Chilean thing I ate. Second, try moving to a place and living there for 6 weeks without getting paid. See how often you'd be going out to eat then and you'd understand that 98% of my food has been bought at the supermarket and cooked in my own home. If I don't have money to eat out, then I'm not eating out. Plus, Chilean food is pretty bland as a whole so if I want to eat out, it's
been mostly Peruvian food since it's so much more diverse and unique than Chilean. But, the pastel de choclo was ridiculously good and I will certainly be having it again.
I've been going on a lot of walks to new parts of the city in my neighborhood that I haven't seen yet and I've got some photos below of places around town I've been. It's a massive city, but I'm really enjoying some of the barrios (neighborhoods) within walking distance of my apartment. I also finally got out for some hiking this weekend. I was supposed to head south to Pucon this weekend, but unfortunately it didn't occur because I got sick and friends of mine backed out at the last minute because they no longer had money. It was disappointing, but Alejandro and I went to a nature reserve inside the city for some hiking on Thursday and then went about an hour and a half outside the city Friday to Cajon de Maipo, which everyone says is beautiful, and they are absolutely correct. It was so nice to get out of the city and have some fresh air. I can't wait to explore more places outside Santiago
and to see what else this beautiful country has to offer.
Advertisement
Tot: 0.083s; Tpl: 0.013s; cc: 5; qc: 45; dbt: 0.0443s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1;
; mem: 1.1mb
